Chicago White Sox

Infielders – Orlando Cabrera is the leadoff hitter for the White Sox for the time being. Considering his OBP is .283, among the lowest on the team, I am not sure what Ozzie Guillen is thinking. Cabrera is a career .240 hitter from the leadoff spot, and there are other players on the roster that would be far better suited in the role. Perhaps Cabrera will run more. With Interleague games coming up next weekend, Jim Thome is likely to sit out two of the three games, if not the whole series despite stealing his first base since 2002 last week against the Twins. Alexei Ramirez is getting a little more playing time lately, he even batted leadoff in one game last week, but he is still not getting enough playing time to make him worth picking up.

Outfielders – Nick Swisher, who is arguably the team’s most patient hitter, was dropped from the top of the order down to the seventh spot, to make room for Carlos Quentin, who continues to rake. Quentin, now batting second, hit his team leading 9th home run in Sundays, and has solidified his status as a top-20 outfielder. Brian Anderson has started the last three games in a row, mainly to give Jermaine Dye a break. Feel free to continue ignoring Anderson, as he has no fantasy value. A week ago it looked as though Jerry Owens’ arrival was imminent. It has since come to light that there is a rift among Sox management regarding Owens. GM Kenny Williams wants him up from Triple A, but Ozzie Guillen does not.

Starting Pitchers – The starters continue to do a good job, with Mark Buehrle being the only inconsistent member of the group. Buehrle’s ERA of 5.31 is almost 2 full runs higher than any other starter.

Bullpen – Octavio Dotel is taking on numerous roles in the pen besides late inning work. With lefties being handled well by Boone Logan and Matt Thornton, Dotel has been getting more innings as a righty specialist, with Scott Linebrink handling the set up role. If you’re looking for middle relievers with decent K rates to punch up your staff’s K production, Dotel (22 K in 14.1 IP) and Thornton (19 K in 13.1 IP) are posting nice K totals.

Other News – It’s funny the way MLB works. As an organization, MLB ignored the steroid issue for years and years, but when a few of the White Sox players decided to bring a couple of blow up dolls into the clubhouse for a fun ritual to ease the tension, MLB comes down on them like two tons of bricks. Go figure.

Player(s) to Target – Octavio Dotel/Matt Thornton if you need middle relief Ks.

Cleveland Indians

Infielders – The mystery that is Travis Hafner has still not worked itself out. He’s hit a little better this past week (.273 avg.) but he’s hit one home run in the last month, and Eric Wedge is benching him more often for “mental health” purposes. Casey Blake showed some life this past week, going 6 for 12 with a couple of doubles. He’s also had 15 RBI in his last 15 games, giving him 25 for the season to lead the Indians. Grady Sizemore is next with 22. They are the only Indians players with more than 20 RBI. Blake is only batting  .236 this season, but he is batting .444 with runners in scoring position. Perhaps Blake sees Andy Marte stealing at-bats in his nightmares. Blake is a free agent at the end of the season, so he’s playing for his next contract, whether he likes it or not. If you’re desperate at 3B, he might be worth a look in AL only formats at this point.

Outfielders – Jason Michaels was shown the gate and ended up getting traded to the Pirates for the old player to be named later, all to make room for Ben Francisco. Wedge installed Francisco into lineup hoping he would jumpstart the Indians lackluster offense. Francisco responded with a decent week, going 5 for 15 with a pair of doubles and three RBI. He will continue to see action as long as he hits, but with Dave Dellucci still around and Shin-Soo Choo on the horizon, Francisco may not be around very long. The Tribe added Jason Tyner to the roster presumably to have an extra position player around for the upcoming Interleague games with Cincinnati.
 
Starting Pitchers – Aaron Laffey had himself another couple of fine outings this past week, and Cliff Lee continued to dominate. Fausto Carmona’s infamous sinker is causing his fantasy owners WHIP ratios to rise as he is walking batters at a ridiculous clip. So far he’s issued 31 free passes in 39 innings.  Jake Westbrook’s rehab is progressing, as he is throwing bullpen sessions and letting it fly. He will probably need just one rehab start before returning to the starting rotation. With Laffey dominating could it be that Carmona or Paul Byrd (who got rocked last time out) gets moved to the bullpen? Not likely, just speculation on my part.

Bullpen – After a couple of shaky outings, Rafael Betancourt has settled down of late. The Indians bullpen has been very stable, even with the loss of Tom Mastny, who was sent down when Jason Tyner was brought up. Rumor has it that Joe Borowski is throwing again and not feeling any pain. However, another rumor has it that his velocity is still missing.

Other News - Interesting stat: There are only three pitchers since 1945 who have won their first six starts with an ERA lower than Cliff Lee’s 0.81: Fernando Valenzuela 0.33 in 1981, Roger Clemens 0.73 in 1991, and Pedro Martinez 0.79 in 1997. All three won the Cy Young award.

Player(s) to Target – Casey Blake – Hey, it sounds crazy, but he has more RBI than Bobby Abreu, Miguel Cabrera, Manny Ramirez, Jim Thome, Hideki Matsui, and Torii Hunter. So, why not?

Detroit Tigers

Infielders – Placido Polanco continues to tear it up, batting .391 over the last seven days, and .375 overall in the month of May. Edgar Renteria is headed in the other direction, slumping badly at 0 for his last 18, and 4 for his last 37.

Outfielders – Jacque Jones was let go last week, and the Tigers brought up Matthew Joyce to replace him. Joyce had a decent week for himself, getting into 5 games and getting 4 hits, including his first big league home run. It’s not clear how long he will be here, and for now at least, he is not worth adding to your roster. After a white-hot start, Curtis Granderson has come crashing back to Earth. He batted just .125 last week with 3 hits in 24 at-bats and he is getting benched against lefties. Jim Leyland says it won’t be that way all the time, but truthfully Granderson has never hit lefties well. His career average against southpaws is just .200.

Starting Pitchers – Dontrelle Willis is back to throwing bullpen sessions and scheduled to resume his rehab down in Triple A. When he is ready to return, Armando Galarraga’s time with the big club will come to an end. Considering how rough a time Nate Robertson and Justin Verlander are both having, it may not be long before Galarraga is back. Verlander’s problems are especially perplexing, as he seems to follow every good outing with a poor one. I get the feeling something is wrong with him, though he is reportedly healthy. Pitching coach Chuck Hernandez believes he has found a flaw in Verlander’s delivery that is flattening out his pitches, but we won’t find out if he is right until the next time he pitches. The flaw was seen in his last outing against the Yankees, in which he was roughed up pretty badly by a Yankee lineup missing several key players.

Bullpen – Denny Bautista is already on a throwing program after just a week on the DL, a good sign that he will be back sooner rather than later. Both Joel Zumaya and Fernando Rodney continue to progress as well, throwing off a mound and scheduled to face hitters in the coming week. No firm timetable on the return of either just yet. Todd Jones is once again showing why he is not one of baseball’s better closers. Slowly but surely his ERA is creeping upward. It’s currently sitting at 4.50 and his WHIP is up to 1.50. If you can get some value for him, I recommend you move him in a trade.

Player(s) to Target – Miguel Cabrera appears to be getting ready to break out. It normally takes a good 100-150 at bats for most hitters that have switched leagues to get accustomed to the differences in the pitching and umpiring. Cabrera is at 139 at-bats and his BABIP of .269 and other peripherals all point to an imminent breakout. In other words, the time to pry him away from a frustrated owner is now! Once he starts hitting, nobody in his right mind will part with him. Make the Cabrera owner in your league an offer now, before it’s too late.

Kansas City Royals

Infielders – Alex Gordon is finally hitting like the player everyone expected last season. Over the past week he has batted .286 with 2 home runs, and 7 RBI to bring his season totals to .282 with 5 HR and 19 RBI. This should be his production rate going forward, and hopefully he will be the consistent performer the Royals thought they were getting.
Miguel Olivo has found his hitting stroke and is making the most of his limited playing time. Olivo has 4 home runs in his 65 at-bats, just one less than the team leader, Alex Gordon, who has twice as many at-bats. Olivo is a good catcher for deeper leagues that use two catchers. Mark Grudzielanek has to be the most useless .300 hitter in fantasy baseball. With just 14 runs scored and 4 RBI, it’s a waste of a roster spot in most leagues.

Outfielders – David DeJesus is finally taking manager Trey Hillman’s on-base message seriously and working on getting on base regularly. He’s raised his batting average to .314 and his OBP to .381. Jose Guillen was dropped to seventh in the batting order, and responded by batting .444 (8 for 19) with 3 doubles and 3 RBI this past week. Guillen is still not worth a roster spot outside of deep AL only formats.

Starting Pitchers – After getting roughed up by the Angels and Rangers, Brian Bannister put the screws to the Orioles by holding them to just 2 hits over 8 innings, striking out 5. Bannister struggles against better hitting teams and dominates the weaker ones, so while he is a good pitcher, he’s not a great one. If you have him, watch his match ups closely, and don’t be shy about sitting him down when the match up is with a strong team.

Bullpen – The bullpen continues to be one of the better groups in baseball. Joakim Soria continues to be nearly perfect, and has yet to give up a single run this season.

Player(s) to Target – None

Minnesota Twins

Infielders – Nick Punto went on the DL with a hamstring problem and the team brought up infielder Alexi Casilla who was their second baseman the second half of last season. Many thought he would make the Twins out of Spring Training and were surprised when Matt Tolbert was chosen instead Casilla can play second or shortstop, with Ron Gardenhire preferring to use him at short. Considering the decent job that Tolbert and Brendan Harris are doing and, Casilla probably won’t see much time on the field.

Outfielders – Craig Monroe is on fire the last two weeks, batting .350 with three home runs and 6 RBI, essentially doubling his season totals to .284 avg. with 4 HR and 16 RBI.

Starting Pitchers – Glen Perkins was impressive in his start replacing Scott Baker. Though he did not get the win, he pitched well enough to win had he gotten the run support to back him up. Perkins’ performance has got to have Kevin Slowey and Boof Bonser looking over their shoulder. Neither of them have been particularly effective, and Ron Gardenhire isn’t shy about going with a hot hand. If Perkins pitches anywhere near as well in his next outing, he could find himself in the rotation going forward.

Bullpen  –  It appears that the Twins may go as far as moving Pat Neshek to the 60 day DL, a sure sign that he is done for the season. The pitcher they are considering bringing along to replace him is Danny Graves. For those of you unfamiliar with Graves, he has been around the block a few times with several teams. He has a fastball that tops out around 88 MPH, and lives or dies with movement (or lack thereof) on his pitches. He was once a closer for the Reds. You want nothing to do with him if he is brought up by the Twins.

Player(s) to Target – Glen Perkins